Allotments 4 All

Hi All,

I'm slowly finalising my legal case against my town council, but to prove the applicability of the Regulations I need evidence of fully-independent allotment sites that operate as a going concern without council subsidy.  I'm really sorry to impose, but if your site is completely independent from the council and operates without any state subside do you think it would be possible for you to ask your secretary to write me a letter that I could use as evidence saying how your site operates without any state subsidy on the revenues you collect from rents - perhaps you could e-mail me the text first just to be sure?

Drop me a PM if you can help.

I'm sorry to have to ask and I know it's' a nuisance, but I don't intend to lose my plot and I have no option but to take court action now to save it.

Many thanks, Simon

now off down to postbox!!  ;)

Simon we are private and quite succesful our secratary  often looks in here at your posts.
I will see him tomorrow and tell him to have a look and no doubt he will contact you.

Cheers Tony, Davy, and that's you guys who've PM'd me too.

Sorry if I sounded a bit desperate.  Actually I'm on top of the situation, but I need to have all the t's crossed and i's dotted and it's a bit of a challenge, but I'm having a good season and enjoying my allotmenteering.

Hope you are successful with the case, be sure to keep us updated with progress.

Dan

Quote from: Admin aka Dan on April 28, 2011, 22:57:00
Hope you are successful with the case, be sure to keep us updated with progress.

Dan

Cheers Dan, I will, and thanks for the support - and for A4A!

Wishing you all the best from accross the pond..go get'em Simon, we are over here waving you on!! XX Jeannine

Good luck Simon, please keep us informed.

Good luck on your quest Simon.  ;)

Hope you win, it'll be good for all of us if you can cut the Council down to size.

what kind of evidence / details do you need in the letter?

Really appreciate your thoughts folks, thanks.

Hi 1066, if the otherside don't accept it as a given, I need to prove that there are private, non-council allotment sites and that there's nothing about allotments that means they can only possibly be provided by the state - it's part of proving that the Unfair Terms in Concumer Contracts Regulations 1999 apply when a council lets an allotment.  We're all familiar enough with the idea of private allotments, but the judge might not be and might need convincing that they're not just provided by councils.

To be honest I'm having difficulty understanding the rules about evidence so I'm not entirely sure what I need or what formalities there might be.  I thought a simple letter from site secretaries might have been enough, and actually I think that's right and I just put that in as my own hearsay evidence, but in general it's better to have direct evidence so I might actually need to call witnesses which seems like a sledge hammer to crack a nut, but there it is - Tony's volunteerd to be called which is really generous and that should be enough, but I'm hoping it won't be necessary and the Council will concede the point.

Ohh..this is getting really interesting..witnesses and all.. ;) Proper job!

If theres any justice in this world you should walk it.  Good luck.

I'll see what I can do Unwashed,

Sent you a pm after being prompted by davyw1

Hi
I rent on a small private site owned by an agricultural and Forestry Estate. There is no financial help at all from anywhere. Rents are low as there are no facilities, allotment holders have fenced there own plots as the plots have gradually been brought back to life over the last few years.
Let me know if you think this is the sort of info you need.

Again, many thanks for your encouragement.

Thanks very much Sumbers - and Davy too - I think where I'm at right now is that I have enough evidence of association-owned and managed sites so thank you for your help, but can I get back to you if I need more.

What I believe I need is a few examples of for-profit allotments, like the New Allotment Company, or actually any sites that aren't run explicitly as not-for-profits.  I've got a couple and that's probably enough, but if anyone's on a non-association private site - just like your's would appear to be ipt8 - I'd be grateful if you could tell me about it.

Thanks again.  Simon.